Who Let the Bogeyman into Neverland?

The bogeyman was Michael Jackson! The truth is now surely out. A very practiced pedophile, MJ employed all the documented wiles of a pedophile using his enormous public image and adoration as a child-like angel of innocence and beneficence. But he knew how to groom his little boy victims and their families as well. He may have believed he loved these little boys but he surely induced them to trust, honor and deeply love him. He was persuasive but never forceful. His love came with the careful sexual seduction of the committed pedophile. All over his child-fantasy Neverland were hidden, guarded sites for secret sexual trysts, boy and man.

There is little doubt that Michael Jackson felt love for his boys and that he allowed himself to join with them as a near equal in their childhood.

.All this is revealed in the HBO documentary Leaving Neverland, where two of his boy victims, now men in their thirties, speak the truth. And their anguished families join in. Their stories are almost unbearably convincing.

In her post-screening interview of the two men, James Safechuck and Wade Robson, Oprah Winfrey probes the dynamics of pedophilic modus operandi: beginning with the selection of a target—an attractive and apparently somewhat vulnerable child — the pedophile begins what is known as a grooming process.

The social misconception of the nature of pedophiles largely clouds the victim and his family's awareness. This is a person known to the family, or someone who insinuates himself into the fond regard of the family. But his eye is on the child, whom we makes known to the family as someone special, a child needing his attention: for extra educational tutoring, for sponsoring the child's ambition, for guiding his spiritual development.

Then, allowed to be alone with the child—having earned the complete trust of the family— he offers the child inntense,  special attention, with special access to exciting events or activities or grown-up privileges. Like Jackson he plies the child with love and forms a deep and eternal-seeming, always secret bond. And he introduces sexual acts as the expression of that bond, as the culmination of their love. But he also warns the child of the need for absolute secrecy and loyalty because the world would condemn them and punish them and break them apart.

There is little doubt that Michael Jackson felt love for his boys and that he allowed himself to join with them as a near equal in their childhood. But it was ultimately a sexual passion for the boy that would eventually leave when the next boy, younger and innocent anew, would come his way. The next seduction was an unavoidable temptation. And boys were always around in droves. Jackson had only to make his selection and fall in love — his truncated, deceptive love — again and again.

Oprah makes clear that the danger is when someone shows more interest in your child than you do. And that someone is always a person you trust and like.

There are now many organizations addressing this issue. I am president of the board of directors of MaleSurvivor.org. Since 1995, MaleSurvivor has been a leader in the fight to improve the resources and support available to male survivors of all forms of sexual abuse in all various contexts: home, schools, religious institutions, military units, prisons, human trafficking programs — everywhere in the US and around the globe.We are a community built upon a unique foundation of respect and mutual partnership between survivors themselves and the professionals who work with them. MaleSurvivor provides a life-sustaining, internet-based discussion forum and chat room for survivors to connect and support each other. There are over 15,000 registered users.


We also provide vital resources to help survivors link to therapists, support groups, and other healing resources. The Hope, Healing and Support Team provides a free, confidential email resource to the public.

Many of us, most of us male survivors, attended and participated in the conversation hosted by Oprah after the screening of Leaving Neverland on HBO.

Watch it!